pulmonary embolism

Life has been hectic since this past Sunday when Lorie and I drove to New York City for another visit to Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center’s (MSKCCs) urgent care facility. Drainage from my chest tube once again changed from amber fluid to the color of a fine Cabernet wine, which signaled that bleeding resumed. More alarming was the accompanying shortness of breath and increased coughing. I was out of breath even from walking a short distance to go to the bathroom.

We arrived at MSKCC around 10am and, following a brief review of recent events, had a chest x-ray taken to get a quick read on the situation. The resulting images showed a complete “white-out” in the left lung, which indicated that fluid had essentially filled the entire space. Normally, the lungs look transparent or black on an x-ray due to air in the lungs.

The fact that I had only one viable lung explained the shortness of breath and coughing. What the x-ray couldn’t reveal was the composition of the fluid (serous fluid, blood, tumor) or its source. For more information, a CT scan was required and scheduled. Unfortunately, weekends at any hospital can be hectic and my CT scan didn’t take place until close to midnight and I was admitted.

Monday morning, we had the pleasure of meeting again with surgeon Dr. Bernard Park, deputy chief of clinical affairs, thoracic service at MSKCC. In December 2016, Dr. Park had successfully performed a bronchoscopy procedure to biopsy a suspicious lymph node near my airway. We knew that we were in good hands.

Dr. Park explained the situation and the requisite next-steps were abundantly clear. For whatever reason, the Aspira Pleural Drainage Catheter in my left lung wasn’t fully draining the fluid – especially towards the top section of my lung. That fluid needed to be drained in order to alleviate shortness of breath and coughing. How to best accomplish this was a source of significant discussion.

One short-term solution was to temporarily insert a plastic tube straight through the front of my chest into the top section of the lung to manually extract the fluid. This would require a brief stay in the hospital while the tube was present and it would be removed prior to going home. A longer-term solution was to place a second PleurX catheter that could be accessed whenever needed at home to extract fluid from the top section of the lung.

In either case, a potential pitfall was that the fluid in the upper section of the lung may actually be fibrotic scar tissue (called loculation) or tumor, preventing effective drainage. Dr. George Getrajdman, an interventional radiologist at MSKCC, proposed a step-wise procedure. First, he would try to extract the fluid near the top of the left lung using a syringe to see “if” anything could be extracted. If so, he could confidently proceed with placement of a second catheter (Option A) or the fluid could simply be drained with the syringe to see if that provided symptomatic relief before proceeding with more permanent catheter placement (Option B). Placing a temporary plastic tube was also a consideration (Option C), with the downside being that fluid accumulates again in the future – requiring another procedure. If no fluid could be extracted with a syringe, then the space was being occupied by something more solid (fibrotic scar tissue and/or tumor mass) and a catheter would be pointless. Ultimately, I decided to proceed with Option A.

Requiring more urgent resolution, however, was the recently discovered blood clot in my iliac vein near the pelvis and its potential to detach and cause a pulmonary embolism (PE) – a condition in which one or more arteries in the lungs become blocked by a blood clot, which could stop blood flow to the lung. With essentially only one lung functioning, a PE in my remaining viable lung would likely be fatal. Hence the sense of urgency.

Due to the recurrence of blood in the drainage from my original chest tube, we reached the point where taking anticoagulant medication (Lovenox®/ enoxaparin sodium) to treat and prevent deep vein thrombosis (DVT) was no longer viable and was discontinued. The only alternative was placement of an inferior vena cava (IVC) filter device designed to trap/prevent my blot clot from traveling from the largest vein in the body, the inferior vena cava, to the lungs or heart.

To insert an IVC filter, I was given medication to help relax and a local anesthetic to numb the area of insertion. Implanting the IVC filter was Dr. Getrajdman, who inserted a catheter through a small incision in my neck. Using X-rays images to guide the procedure, he advanced the IVC filter through the catheter and into the inferior vena cava. Once the IVC filter was in place, he removed the catheter and put a small bandage on the insertion site.

X-ray image following drainage of 1.5 liters of fluid from left lung showing air returning to the top portion (red circle).

Fortunately, Dr. Getrajdman was also able to deal with the left lung issue during the same procedure. Approximately 1.5 liters of fluid were successfully acquired from the top portion of the lung, so he proceeded with placement of a second catheter as planned/hoped. Both procedures took about 1.5 hours in total to complete. Afterwards, an x-ray confirmed that the top portion of the lung was free of fluid as shown in the accompanying image.

My breathing improved immediately following the procedure and I felt fine with all of the pain medication. However, waking up the next day (Tuesday) I felt like I’d been hit by a truck. There was a fair amount of pain at both the incision on my neck from the IVC filter insertion and the newly placed catheter site. As the day progressed, the pain diminished and I started feeling much better.

By late afternoon, tissue plasminogen activator (TPA) was injected through my original Aspira chest tube to help clear the line by breaking down blood clots. Afterwards, we were trained on using the “new” PleurX catheter and then proceeded with draining fluid from both the top and bottom catheters. The top PleurX catheter rapidly drained 500cc of fluid, which looked far less bloody than what had previously been extracted from the bottom. We were only able to drain 200cc of fluid from the bottom Aspira catheter, which was still bloody and thicker. It’s speculated that the fluid from the bottom was left over from before and there was no active bleeding, which will be confirmed by monitoring hemoglobin levels.

With the IVC filter in place and the ability to drain both top/bottom fluid from my left lung, I was able to proceed with my second dose of chemotherapy while in the hospital. This consisted solely of paclitaxel and then next week should be my initial loading dose with cetuximab.

We’re planning to try draining both chest tube sites today (Wednesday) and looking for further improvement in subsequent chest x-rays. Assuming all goes well, I should be released from the hospital but need to stay in NYC overnight and see my oncologist tomorrow. I’m feeling much better now, but the coming days should be when the effects of my first week of chemotherapy (paclitaxel/carboplatin) start materializing. In any event, I’ll be happy to get home hopefully tomorrow and see how big our new puppy Humphrey has grown in the short time we’ve been away.

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About this Blog

Welcome to my journey and my journal. Aside from the fact that I find writing cathartic, one purpose for this blog is to keep family and friends updated following my diagnosis with Stage IV oropharyngeal cancer in December 2015. An additional benefit is that some of the content may be a helpful resource for others dealing with head/neck cancer. Lastly, I hope that by sharing this experience freely, I can help create greater awareness for HPV and its link to six cancers with the hope that preteen vaccination rates improve. The blog posts are in reverse chronological order and go all the way back to November 2015.